The law is the law

Editor,

I respect the law. But actions speak louder than words. For my part, I have dedicated most of my adult life risking my neck to enforce the laws that protect people and their property. Many of those people were strangers to me. More than a few of them returned my dedication to enforcing laws fairly and equally with hatred and contempt, usually because I did not enforce existing law exactly the way they wanted me to enforce it.

No problem. The law is the law. Working as a police officer for over a quarter of a century, I always strove to enforce the law within the law. That I put forward my best effort to do so was all I needed to know in my heart to get up every day and do my job. I'm retired now. But when a criminal escaped punishment because of a legal technicality on my watch, I did not take matters into my own hands. Our criminal justice system, like most things, does not work perfectly. After all, it is the law, not my law.

I also live in Montana House District 12, and lately, there has been a lot of talk from supporters of Rick Jore that has cast dispersions in the direction the Montana Supreme Court and Jeanne Windham. This makes me feel uncomfortable for several reasons.

There are, of course, several different civil and legal routes available to effect change in a law that a person, or a group of people, do not like. One of the ways is to run for elective office. This was Rick Jore's choice. And it has always been the duty of the courts to decide whether laws have been properly followed during the election process. It is their duty because sometimes laws are ignored. Many times, they are ignored for partisan political reasons. That is why we have laws and legal guidelines to ensure a fair and impartial — also known as "legal" — election process.

Rick has been complaining that he has committed no crime in running for elective office, therefore he should not be required to pay his own legal and attorney's fees. I think he is confusing criminal law with civil law. It is easy to do. But it was also his choice to include the awarding of attorneys fees to the prevailing party and he is now responsible for the consequences of his own legal actions vis-a-vis the choices he made. Rick apparently supported the lower court's decision when he believed that he was the prevailing party. Now he does not.

Personally, I disagree with the whole "prevailing party" idea, and think he shouldn't have had to make the choice in the first place. But he did. And that's the law as it stood at the time, right or wrong. A lot of "little people" have been intimidated by the prevailing party rule for a long time now. It is a bad law in my opinion. But it is not about me, either.

If any party other than Jore himself ought to be required to contribute to Rick Jore's attorney and legal fees, it should be the Lake County Election Board. That was the entity responsible for a fair and impartial vote count in the first place. Their colossal errors in judgment, for whatever reason, can be directly attributed to the position that Jore finds himself in today. A six-to-one majority Supreme Court ruling makes that abundantly clear.

So there was in fact no real "tie" in the first place. I believe that it is the lawful duty of the Montana Supreme Court to decide the issue in these types of cases, and in my opinion their decision was a correct one. Either way, the decision has been made. It should be respected by all law abiding citizens, including Rick Jore.

C. S. Willet St. Ignatius